India-linked films narrowly miss TIFF top award

Toronto: Mira Nair's new film 'Queen of Katwe' and an Indian missing boy drama by Australian filmmaker Garth Davis have narrowly lost to Hollywood musical 'La La Land' at the people's choice awards of the Toronto film festival.

'Lion', starring Dev Patel as a young adopted Indian looking to discover his lost family, took the first runner-up while 'Queen of Katwe', an inspiring tale of a chess prodigy from the slums of Uganda, bagged the second runner-up prize.

The top prize winner, musical comedy 'La La Land' by American Damien Chazelle starring Ryan Ghosling and Emma Stone, which premiered at the Venice festival, has been a huge crowd puller in Toronto along with 'Lion' and 'Queen of Katwe'.

The awards were announced on the concluding day of the 41st Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) yesterday.The festival, which began on September 8 with the screening of 'The Magnificent Seven' starring Denzel Washington, came to a close with the screening of the top prize winning film, 'La La Land'.

The Toronto festival's people choice awards are considered the barometer for the Oscar awards.
Several people's choice winners like 'Slumdog Millionaire' (2008), 'King's Speech' (2010) and '12 Years a Slave' (2013) have gone on to win the Oscar award for Best Picture.Set in modern day Los Angeles, 'La La Land', an original musical about everyday life, explores the joy and pain of pursuing dreams like the film's protagonists, an aspiring actress and a struggling musician.

The award carries a 15,000-dollar cash prize.'Queen of Katwe', Nair's new film after 'The Reluctant Fundamentalist' two years ago, tells the story of Phiona Mutesi, who win the Ugandan national chess championship after chancing upon a game in a camp for slum children one day.The best Asian film prize went to 'In Between' by Maysaloun Hamoud, about the lives of Arab-Israeli women who are considered not Israeli enough in Israel and as part of a culture that views them as not quite Palestinian.

'In Between' was chosen for the top prize for the Network for the Promotion of Asian Pacific Cinema (NETPAC) Award, which is in its fifth year, from among the films from Asia taking part in the festival.The NETPAC jury said the film was "confident debut about three contemporary Palestinian women living in Tel Aviv whose strong bond of sisterhood supports an exploration and shift in relationships, careers, and sexuality".Two Indian films - 'Qissa' (2013) and 'Maragarita With a Straw' (2014) - had earlier won the NETPAC award in Toronto.(UNI)